


Letter H: Heart Transplant

by authorangelita (angel)



Series: Fic Alphabet Challenge: Teen Wolf [10]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Heart, Organ Transplantation, Season/Series 01
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-24
Updated: 2016-03-24
Packaged: 2018-05-28 17:16:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,436
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6338026
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/angel/pseuds/authorangelita
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Laura Hale died in a car accident, and her organs were donated.  Stiles received her heart.  Derek stumbles across him in the Preserve one day and all he can hear is his dead sister's beating heart.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Letter H: Heart Transplant

**Author's Note:**

> Part of the Fic Alphabet Challenge at [my Tumblr](http://authorangelita.tumblr.com/). 
> 
> Again, I went for the most angsty version of this so the medical aspect is about as sound as you'd expect from a fic about a show about werewolves. Enjoy!

Derek couldn't spend another minute in the burned out shell of his childhood home. He'd avoided Beacon Hills for as long as possible, but his family lawyers were here, and they insisted that he go to their offices to sign papers regarding Laura's death and take possession of some items she'd left him. He'd thought that seeing the old Hale house would… Well, he wasn't sure what he thought, but all it did was make him remorseful and uneasy. 

He chose a direction at random and started walking. It was fall, so the weather was nice, temperate. He stuffed his hands into his leather jacket pockets and held the talisman that Laura had left him in his right hand. It was a smooth stone with a triskele, the Hale family symbol, etched on it. The family motto sprang to mind, but it only made him sadder that there wasn't much left of the Hale family any longer.

As he looked down over the creek that flowed through the property, he heard something familiar. His brow wrinkled as he concentrated. It sounded like the cadence of Laura's heartbeat. It was beating more quickly than he was used to, but he'd spent many days of his life, curled up with his sister, listening to the sound of her heart. He'd know it anywhere. 

He hurried toward the sound. As he got closer, he realized that there were three teenagers – two boys and a girl – hiking through the preserve, and the heartbeat was coming from one of them. He kept his distance but watched and listened to their interaction.

"I think we should take a break," a dark-haired boy said, pointing to a fallen log just off the path.

"No, dude. We've only been out here like ten minutes." The other boy laughed and deliberately quickened his steps to move past the log. 

"It's been at least thirty, and we've walked, like, a mile, Stiles. Come on." Dark-haired boy looked like it was personal affront that his friend didn't want to stop. 

"Relax, Scott," a dark-haired girl put her arm around dark-haired boy's – Scott's – waist and leaned into him. "Let's just enjoy our hike."

Stiles turned around and walked backwards while looking at the couple. "Allison's starting to become my favorite, just so you know. I'm _fine_." Just as he said it, he stepped on a fallen tree branch and flailed his hands out to catch his balance.

"Oh my, god, dude! You're going to give _me_ a heart attack." Scott clutched at his chest with one hand and pulled an asthma inhaler out of his pocket with his other. "This was such a bad idea." He shook the inhaler and took a couple of hits. 

"Look, if you want to head back, we can head back, but this is the first time I've been out of the house in literally years, and I'm not ready to go back yet." Stiles turned around and walked away from his friends. He looked distressed, and he rubbed his chest once he was several feet away from the others. 

Laura had died in a car accident, and she'd told Derek years ago that she wanted to donate her organs, if at all possible. He couldn't deny her that, especially after she'd told him that other werewolves in their family had done so without ill-effects for the humans who received the organs. If anything, werewolf organs were in better shape and tended to be more hearty that human organs. 

Derek hadn't wanted to know who the recipients of Laura's organs were, and he was wholly unprepared to find one accidentally. Part of him wanted to run up and press his ear to the boy's chest and listen to Laura's heart beat forever, but he was smarter than that. Derek kept his distance but followed the teens as they wandered through the Preserve at a pace that gradually got slower and slower as Stiles' energy clearly flagged. 

Allison and Scott had both noticed and turned him back toward their car about twenty minutes after Derek had first found them. As he watched them drive away from the Preserve, he headed back to his own car and catalogued everything he'd learned about Stiles Stilinski and his friends while he'd been tailing them. 

• He was the Sheriff's son  
• He was still recovering from the heart transplant  
• His friends were very protective  
• He hated that  
• The boys loved video games  
• The girl did not

He went back to the motel room that he'd booked when he got to town and spent the night trying to talk himself out of doing something stupid.

~~!!~~

Although Derek hadn't been in town since he was a sixteen, he doubted the Sheriff had moved. Anyone who'd ever been a teen in Beacon Hills knew where the Sheriff's house was so that parties could be planned outside of a two-mile radius from the house. 

There was only one car in the driveway - an older model, blue Jeep - when Derek pulled up and parked at the curb the next morning. He took a deep breath, steeled his nerves, and walked up to the door. Before he could second-guess himself again, he pressed the doorbell button.

From deep inside the house, Stiles shouted, "Be right there!"

Derek rubbed the triskele stone in his jacket pocket while he waited. It was calming, and he desperately needed that since he could hear Laura's heart beating from where he was standing. It was all he could do to not bust down the door to hear it more clearly. 

A minute later, the door swung open to show Stiles with a towel around his neck and water glistening on his exposed skin. The neck of the shirt didn't quite cover the top of the scar that disappeared vertically down his chest. 

"Hello?"

Derek cleared his throat. "Hi, I'm Derek. Derek Hale."

"Oh! Derek as in Laura Hale… Hi!" Stiles grinned and stepped back as he waved toward the inside of the house. "Come in."

"I didn't mean to interrupt," Derek gestured to the towel.

"Don't worry about it." Stiles led him into the living room and sat down on the couch. Derek took the nearby recliner. "I'm actually glad to see you. I didn't know how to get in touch with you, and I didn't know you'd be in town, obviously. But I wanted to thank-"

Derek held up a hand to stop him. "Please don't. That's not why I’m here." Stiles looked confused, and Derek sighed softly. "How much do you know about the… the donor?"

"Not much. Just that her name was Laura Hale. The hospital gave me an address in New York for her, but I didn't get a response back to the letter I wrote. I don't know if you got it?"

Derek shook his head. "We shared an apartment in New York, but I haven't been back there in a while to check the mail." 

"Oh. Well, it was mostly a thank you, which I know you don't want to hear, but this," Stiles gestured to his chest, "is amazing. There really aren't words-"

Derek cleared his throat to stop Stiles from going on. "Do you mind if I ask why you…"

"Why I needed a heart transplant?" Rubbing a hand over his buzzcut, Stiles looked away for a moment. "I had cardiomyopathy, which affects the muscle and how well the heart beats. The doctors think it started with a strep throat infection that wasn't treated properly. Once the heart's damaged, it just gets worse and worse." Stiles shrugged and wiped a tear away from his eye. "I couldn't even get out of bed before the transplant, but now, I'm getting better. I might even try out for the lacrosse team next year."

Derek wanted to comfort Stiles, but he wasn't sure how. He hadn't touched anyone voluntarily since Laura died. Hesitantly, he reached over and squeezed Stiles' shoulder. "Laura wanted to help people. She told me years ago about her wish if anything should happen to her. I'm glad that you're doing well with her…"

Stiles put a hand on his chest, over the scar. He looked into Derek's eyes for a moment, and then softly asked, "Do you want to listen?"

Derek nodded and moved to crouch in front of Stiles. He slowly placed his ear against Stiles' chest and gasped when the sound took over his entire being. It was like having Laura with him again. 

Derek wasn't sure how long he stayed there, but when he pulled back, Stiles had tears in his eyes again. "Thank you," Derek whispered.

~End


End file.
